Black mangrove

Value to bees

Nectar

High

Pollen

Moderate

As a honey crop

Major honey crop — yields a surplus in good years

Which bees, and why

The flowers are small, shallow and openly presented, so they are accessible to bees, wasps and flies alike. Honey bees work them heavily where stands are extensive.

Worth knowing

A good summer nectar source in a coastal landscape with few alternatives.

Flowering

In flower

June to August (northern hemisphere)

A summer flow, and one of the more reliable in coastal Florida.

When nectar flows

Generous. The flowers are small but produced in enormous numbers across extensive stands.

Year-to-year variation

Reliable where mangrove cover is intact, and directly reduced by coastal development and hurricane damage.

What it does to the honey

Contributes a distinct saline-mineral edge that reflects the tidal ground the trees grow in — one of the clearest examples of terroir in a honey.

Growing it

Conditions

Tidal saline mud in full sun. It is one of the few trees that tolerates regular salt-water inundation, and it is frost-sensitive at the northern edge of its range.

Size

3-15 m tall, shorter at the cold edge of its range.

Native range

Tropical and subtropical American coasts — Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, and both coasts of Central and South America, plus West Africa.

Suits

Large gardens

• Not a garden plant outside tropical and subtropical coasts.
• Legally protected in Florida and elsewhere; removal generally requires a permit.
• Its pneumatophores need unobstructed mud — filling or paving around a mangrove kills it.

What it looks like

A shrubby to medium tree with dark green leaves whitish beneath and often salt-crusted, surrounded by dense fields of pneumatophores — vertical breathing roots to 20 cm. Small white four-petalled flowers appear in clusters through summer.